Meadville City Council on Wednesday outlined a schedule and format for its review of the 2023 city budget that attempts to put into practice the emphasis on an inclusive process that has been a priority for the four most recently elected council members.
“A lot of us up here many times have reiterated our commitment to a more participatory government and a more transparent government,” said Councilwoman Autumn Vogel, who has consistently been the most vocal proponent of modifying the budget process. “It’s neat to see these things actually moving.”
One early element of an approach designed to entice input from a wider selection of city stakeholders ends soon: The deadline to submit responses to a community survey on how the city’s $632,000 in federal pandemic relief funds should be spent is Friday. The 32-question survey is open not only to city residents, but also to owners of city real estate who live elsewhere and people employed in the city who reside elsewhere.
City Manager Maryann Menanno did not have up-to-date statistics on how many people had been reached since the survey was released online and in hard copies on Oct. 10, but told council it had gotten off to a good start with 78 online responses within the first two days.
After the survey window closes, Menanno said, staff members will comb through responses to weed out any duplicates and confirm that respondents fell into at least one of the eligible categories before reporting the results to council.
The survey won’t be the only interactive element in the budgetary process. Council members also consented to Menanno’s proposal to purchase budget presentation software to be used in upcoming public information sessions.
The Balancing Act application, which will cost $3,500 for one year of use, creates visually rich budget simulations based on the city’s data and allows meeting participants to adjust the projected figures and immediately see the effects of such adjustments. It also allows city officials to establish parameters so that user adjustments don’t become unrealistic, Menanno added, “so you couldn’t, let’s say, defund an entire department.”
Three public sessions are planned: Nov. 15 from 6 to 8 p.m., Nov. 17 from 1 to 3 p.m., and Nov. 19 from 3 to 5 p.m. Councilman Jim Roha noted that the final session was planned for a Saturday and said that a similar weekend information session on the zoning ordinance update that council has worked on in recent months was attended by only one member of the public. About nine members of the public came two other sessions held on weekdays, according to Menanno.
But other members of council were resistant to Roha’s suggestion that more weekday evening options be offered. The sessions will be repeating the same information, so those interested need only attend one, they noted.
“We’re trying to reach everyone,” Mayor Jaime Kinder said. “Making sure that we have multiple times makes it so not just first shift (employees) can come, right? It’s too bad that a lot of people didn’t come on that Saturday, but sometimes there are people who can come on Saturday.”
For those who do come, computers will be available to allow them to take a stab at allocating the city’s limited budget resources. City department heads will be there to answer questions — and presumably make their cases for the budget allocations they are requesting.
Even those who can’t make it in person will be able to use the Balancing Act presentation and software via their phones, according to Menanno.
While Vogel has been the council member most supportive of soliciting more input on the budget from more stakeholders in the city, Roha has consistently expressed reservations and even skepticism about such an approach. Roha is in his fourth term on council — his first came in the late 1970s — while his fellow members are all in their first term, including Kinder and Councilwoman Gretchen Myers, who are in their first year, and he is also the only Republican member of council, so perhaps it’s not surprising when his position is that of an outlier in comparison to other members.
On Wednesday, though he questioned the timing of the public information sessions, he offered his support for spending on the software that will be used at those sessions, and even drew laughs from his fellow members in doing so.
“I’m willing to give it a try,” Roha said, “because I’m very easy going and open minded.”
While Vogel was among those smiling, she also emphasized a serious aspect to the budget season plans implemented by council’s newest members and pointed to the survey, the budget presentation software, and the planned meetings as a “manifestation of that.”
“The kind of general approach to the budgeting season — I’m glad about that too,” she said. “I don’t think that it’ll be easy or change everything overnight. That would be naive, right? But I hope that we can really make a good faith effort to do our due diligence here in a more participatory way of budgeting and governing and make a commitment to try it for a few years.”
